Archive for iHurt

And it feels about like this

Saturday night, I broke my own “no partying on Saturdays when you work on Sunday” rule and after working a thirteen hour shift at the clinic, donned “whore boots” and a mini skirt and hit up the Earl in East Atlanta to see one of the local funk and soul bands. I met up with my former coworkers-turned-friends, plus the guy from Athens (unexpectedly), and had truly the best time out I have had in a while. We got there at 7:30 and finally left around 1am, slightly inebriated and utterly danced out, and it was so completely worth the pain of getting up at 5am the next morning for another 13 hour shift. And dude! I was introduced, completely out of the blue, to a local photographer whose work I’ve been following for a while now. Night? Made. In a thousand different ways, made.

But now, it’s raining and the view out the window about matches the tone of the last few days. Everything is muted, but I can’t say that I don’t like it. The quiet is nice, if a little gloomy.

In other news, he proved me right. He didn’t succeed, but he tried and he forced his hand. I had figured as much. She texted me last week and said she didn’t want to talk about it. She did anyway, legs swinging over the arm of the chair and laughing it off, as if by smiling she could prove it didn’t hurt. And all I could see was me, swallowing the hurt and trying to laugh off the details of my own sordid misery to the PS, just in case she didn’t take it seriously. Because if I didn’t, then it wouldn’t hurt if she didn’t either, right? So it was that with The-Hobbit-turned-Cinderella, I took it seriously even when she couldn’t quite bring herself to. And it sucks swallowing the big-sister reaction and taking on instead that of the parent, the confidante, the … therapist? Fuck if I know. Too many hats to keep them all straight.

And completely unrelated, I realized the other day that it’s been a year since Des died. It snowed the same day, too. You’d think I’d forget … as if the failed five would let me. The dynamic here just isn’t the same, and I think I just miss how it was when it was only the Brindle Brothers, Desmond, and me. We had the apartment then, not the flooding dungeon of horrors as we do now; we had the Other Half; we had our sense of independence. Now? I don’t know what we have. Except a big, fucking hole.  Which is neither here nor there. But hey, it’s midnight and I always spew without censorship after midnight (just ask the PS … God knows she’s gotten enough early morning emails from me to know).

So yeah. It’s all greyed out, not even black and white but just greyed and blurred and slightly out of focus. And it feels about like this, which I couldn’t explain if I tried. It just … does.

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And by the way, mini-comas don’t fix things

She offered to let me borrow the DVD we had watched the day before, almost as if in an effort to console me. I declined; she seemed surprised.

And today, the stupid sedatives finally oozing their way out of my system, leaving only a hazed depression behind it, so am I. If I declined a token of comfort from her, especially one of music, I was a hell of a lot worse off than I thought. Jesus God.

I think it’s time to hand over the chill pills. Enough.

(And yeah, you get a twofer. It’s late, I can’t sleep, and I can’t stop thinking about, for lack of a better word, stuff. Cheerful-ish thoughts and pictures in color to return at a later date).

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Perspective

People don’t believe me when I say rescuers are crazy. You have to be to see what we see (I can’t imagine being a children’s social worker, dear God), to do what we do, and to still not off yourself … and then someone goes and actually does it. Or in this case, two people.

Two local rescuers (one from the organization I am active with) committed suicide only a day apart this week. Unrelated, but same method. There are a lot of hurt people and a lot of disadvantaged dogs around here right now.

This is why I take breaks. It’s why I avoid animal control some weeks, why I delete emails without opening them, why I let myself burn out and build back up. Because I’ve said it since I started—if you can’t take care of yourself, you’re sure as shit not taking care of anyone else. Spread yourself too thin in rescue and you’re not helping anyone at all.

But so sayeth the girl who has been down that road a time too many and continues to dally on it—it is of course, an instance of “do as I say and not as I do.” So in continuing the week’s theme of “Foster Homes on the Edge,” I sabotaged my session with the PS on Tuesday for reasons yet to be ascertained, which in turn inspired a fourteen-hour sedative-induced sleep, and all of the guilt that follows. Upon waking and calling one of my friends to let her know about the first of the deaths, she asked, “So, do you see what would happen? Now do you get it?”

Yeah, I get it.

(And because I wouldn’t feel as though this post were complete without it: 1-800-SUICIDE / 1-800-784-2433. Give it to someone. Use it yourself. Just get it out there).

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You Wouldn’t Think

I’ve been in it for years. I know the reality. Things that shouldn’t happen, things that defy logic and common sense, happen. Behind the double doors, where it’s all a juggling act of numbers and a deadly game of musical chairs, logic and common sense don’t cease to exist so much as they simply find new definitions in the face of the reality confined within those four walls.

I know all of that … I know, I know, I know.

But I still get caught off guard, I still get punched in the gut, and I still stop and stare at a kennel that shouldn’t be empty but suddenly is.

Because you wouldn’t think that a twelve week old bundle of wrinkles and a twelve-week-old bundle of wiggles, with their blue coats and matching blue eyes, would have any trouble getting out the front door.

You wouldn’t think that in the ten days the two were there, that I would be the only one to look twice.

You wouldn’t think space would run out as quickly as it did.

You wouldn’t think. You just wouldn’t think.

But then again, neither did the one who wanted “just one litter” and then threw away the leftovers. Neither did the ones who passed them by in favor of smaller choices.

They didn’t think. I didn’t think. And that is perhaps how the unthinkable gets its foot in the door every, single time. Because nobody thinks it could.

And the only thing I can think right now is that I’m tired of losing.

Those who are dead are not dead
They’re just living my head …
And since I fell for that spell
I am living there as well …

Coldplay, “42

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Love Harder

Love Harder

I woke up this morning to a Google Reader overwhelmed by a single message: Love Harder.

And while a smile here and a hug there, or letting someone ahead of me in traffic and helping someone’s grandmother at the grocery store all have absolutely nothing to do with cancer, “love harder” was still a fitting message to rise to this morning, as I’ve made a quiet point of integrating the attitude into my daily life lately. Apparently, when I’m barely working and not eyeballs deep in schoolwork, I like to get back to basics and concentrate on radiating love (it would be cheesy if it weren’t Belle Renee’s blog post—so click the blasted link already). Who knew?

Anywho. Most of the blogosphere knows who Brandy is. Personally, I read a hell of a lot more than I ever comment over there, and honestly, I don’t know her, aside from the parts of herself that she shares with us via her blog. She’s not on my Gchat list, nor is her email address saved to my contacts list. I don’t even think I have her on my blogroll (which is a total problem, if that’s the case … I should go check on that, actually). So I feel more like I’m jumping on a bandwagon than showing any sort of support for someone I care about; I never even posted her original plea because it seemed like it just wasn’t my place, as a relative stranger. But regardless, the bottom line is that I hold a lot of admiration and respect for the woman, and if this is all I can do, then, dammit, I’m doing it.

Besides, I think everyone—wherever they are, whatever they’re wrestling with in their personal lives—can afford to love harder. So read it, do what you can to make a difference, and take the message home with you tonight.

Love harder. Life’s too short not to.

Our Plea

Our friend Brandy is a brilliant writer, a wonderful teacher, and a generous friend.  And she is in love with a man who has just been diagnosed with multiple myeloma.

We are raising money for the Multiple Myeloma Research Fund in his name.  For the price of a cinnamon dolce latte, half-caf, hold the whip, you can be part of an effort to cure a disease that affects approximately 750,000 people worldwide.

http://www.loveharder.org

Every dollar brings us a dollar closer to a cure.  And every donation brings a sliver of hope to a girl who needs all the hope she can get.

What You Can Do

  • Give. Be part of a worldwide effort to cure a disease that affects approximately 750,000 people worldwide.  Every dollar helps.
  • Pass it on. Forward this story to five people.  Share this blog post.  Become our fan on Facebook.
  • Love harder. Life is short, love is unbending, and no one knows what could happen next. Tell someone you love them today.

Where Your Money Goes

  • The American Institute of Philanthropy recently named The Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation one of the best organizations to give to in terms of their accountability and use of resources.
  • By working closely with researchers, clinicians and partners in the biotech and pharmaceutical industry, the MMRF has helped bring multiple myeloma patients four new treatments that are extending lives around the globe.
  • The MMRF has advanced twenty Phase I and Phase II clinical trials. They need your support to advance these clinical research programs and accelerate the development of better, more effective treatments.
  • The MMRF’s Multiple Myeloma Genomics Initiative recently became the first to sequence the multiple myeloma whole genome in its entirety.
  • A whopping 98% of your donation to the MMRF will be used immediately to support high-priority multiple myeloma research.
  • With diminishing funding for early stage drug development and the next myeloma treatments not expected to be approved until 2011, the MMRF desperately needs your help.

Brandy’s Story can be found here

DONATE: http://www.loveharder.org
CONTACT: theloveharderfund@gmail.com
FACEBOOK: http://facebook.loveharder.org
MORE INFO: http://www.themmrf.org

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The other F word, or “This is why: Pt II”

She’d been silent, he’d been angry. It was the day before semester would begin, and I knew the question was going to come up sooner or later. I had hoped it would be today, when I had more than just three hours of sleep preceding a thirteen-hour shift and six hours of driving on icy roads under my belt. But they’ve never been much for timing, so last night it was.

“What all did you sign up for this semester?”

It was a loaded question; she’d never given a damn before and she damn well knew the answer without needing to ask me. She had me cornered at my computer again, per her usual tactic, and the exaggerated innocence of her inquiry told me from the get-go that this couldn’t possibly end well. The conversation went as predictably wrong as could be imagined, and my fingers arced into claws of frustration over my computer keyboard as I measured my words, my tone, my pace. I told her the truth, which was “nothing.” I also told her why, but she was too busy berating me for laziness and apathy and reminding me of “the whole reason you moved home” to hear it.

I could see the gears grinding in her head as she contemplated the “consequences and ramifications” to be imposed due to my “misbehavior.”  Because in her mind, I’m still twelve years old and subject to simple disciplinary measures that will change my mind about “acting out.” She still believes that taking away my radio or locking me out of my email account will bend me into submission of her current idea of what’s right and necessary.

She chose not to probe for the details surrounding my decision—as I’m sure she damn well knew the answers to that one, too—and ignored my responses entirely, preferring to talk in meaningless circles rather than to allow words to accomplish something that is not, for once, destructive. She walked away a few minutes later in irritation, midway through my response to one of her questions. I figured that the conversation would continue in the morning, but I didn’t expect her to instead hand off will-wrestling duties to my father five minutes later.

He walked into the room with an ominous casualness and said simply that if there were late fees for registration, he needed me to register before midnight tonight … “On your mark, get set, go!” for College Conversations Gone Wrong, Take Two. I looked at my keyboard and told him, just as I had told my mother, that I’m not in a space to handle the pressure and deadlines, that I need to back off for a moment and deal with the more pressing parts of life right now. He went rigid at my perceived resistance, demanded reasons, and I opted for the plain, simple truth.

“Because I’ve tried for a year, and it’s damn near killed me. I can’t do it here and I’m afraid of what will happen if I put that kind of pressure on myself right now.”

His voice rose alongside his anger. “Well, I don’t know what it’s going to take, but I suggest you look closer to home before trying to project any problems on this household.” … Try the mirror, I finished dutifully in my head, knowing the rest of the sentence all too well, and I lowered my tone, my intensity, and my gaze to compensate for the heightened state of his.

Too tired to defend myself with any amount of anger, too disappointed in myself to even try to pretend to be okay, I rattled off every reason that I don’t belong in this house or in a classroom, all at his incessant prodding. He continued taking jabs, pushing the issue, and I finally gave up the last explanation I had.

“Because I have relapsed on every, single self-abusive tendency I could ever come up with, and created some new ones along the way. I wasn’t being dramatic when I said it’s damn near killed me, Dad. I … can’t … handle it right now. I just … can’t. I’m sorry.”

The “sorry” was less a weakened apology than it was simply a tear-stained regret, but I knew he wasn’t really listening, anyway. Sure enough, livid once again, he walked away before I’d finished speaking, and moments later, his bedroom door slammed overhead.

And the failure remains, as always, with me. If not here and at the cost of family image and expectation, it would have been in the classroom and at the cost of a semester’s tuition. Either way, they still – still - only see the failure. Dammit.

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THIS is why, dammit (warm fuzzies, look away, look away now)

So, a little spewing of brutally honest, livid lividness (yeah, I made it up, shuddup), just for fun (depending on your definition of the word).

You know when life is awesome?

It’s awesome when you quit your new fucking job after being called stupid and unfit to work with animals because your retard of a boss (SHOUT OUT, homeboy!) doesn’t bother to train you for any of the THREE positions into which he flings you on Day One and you decide that no amount of abuse taken to that degree is worth a FT paycheck (actually, you quit more because he’s going to fire you in a minute anyway because he’s an inept jackass, so you figure you might as well skedaddle and shake hands with him before you lose your cool and BITE HIS FUCKING HAND OFF INSTEAD). And THEN you get a cowardly text from your sister the next day telling you that you’re a “stupid bitch who would cause a lot less trouble” if you “hurried up and died already instead of just thinking about it all the damn time” (that is VERBATIM, folks), and your own dog takes the bottle of sedatives you keep OD’ing on and buries it for you in the backyard (thanks, Ivan, ‘preciate it, man). And you go the shelter because where ELSE the hell are you going to go, and you save a death-row Cane Corso mastiff because you’re the only one who understands why he’s being an asshole (because he’s protection-trained) and you’re the only one who speaks his language (which would be German), and when you share your great excitement with your mother because you’re STUPID enough to think she might GIVE A DAMN about your having gotten him another chance, SHE FUCKING HANGS UP on you after saying she hopes the pound kills “the damned thing” in front of you.

And it’s snowing and snow is supposed to be all pretty and happy and shit, and I really wanted to be excited about it, because I’ve wanted it since forever, but now it’s just pissing me off because Atlanta drivers can’t drive in the RAIN let alone, OH MY FUCKING GOD, SNOW!!!!! HOLY SHIT!!!! so they’re all acting like glaucoma-riddled grannies with one glass eye a piece. AND also because the stupid floods of ’09 (nope, not done beating that dead horse yet) destroyed my winter coat, so I don’t have anything but a hoodie when I have to go out into Satan’s wretched whitewash so I’m FUCKING COLD as FUCKING SHIT.

And the Psych Spectacular completely, devastatingly misunderstood the last text I sent her because I fucking SUCK at asking for help, so I scratched that little option too and now have a 120 lb Presa laying ON TOP of me refusing to let me get up, which is nice of him to play psych ward attendant and all, but you know … I still think I should be holding my own, without him OR the PS. Because I hate needing and I hate not standing on my own two fucked up feet even more.

So this, THIS is why I’m already cursing 2010. THIS is why I haven’t posted in a minute. THIS is why I have 122 posts in my reader and I’m NOT FUCKING TOUCHING THEM UNTIL I CAN STOP CUSSING. This is why I can’t handle school right this very semester and have thus handed my folks more ammunition for, “Yeah, well, if any one of you wouldn’t be able to hack it, it WOULD have been you, wouldn’t it?” To which I want to point to their DFACS record and ask if maybe they think the two are quite possibly related, but I like to pick my battles so I just shut up and go back to the bat cave and text the PS and make life worse for myself.

So this, THIS is why … I don’t even know why. It just is why. And it’s going to be why for a minute.

(The lack of FT jobbery, by the way, means I’m STILL stuck in the GODFORSAKEN BASEMENT, which was my itsy-bitsy glimmer of hope and the whole reason I was willing to sit out Sir Jackass’s abuse in exchange for a decent paycheck. The fucking basement, where the water heater blew and flooded the place AGAIN, and the degenerates who dare call themselves my parents IGNORED IT FOR FOUR DAYS after I pointed out that I was splashing around my bedroom again. WTF, mate? You know, a friend is building a barn for her horses and I am seriously, SERIOUSLY, two steps from moving into a stall and living like the fucking baby Jesus for a few. It would be bigger – and warmer – than this bullshit.

In the meantime, in the face of such livid angrypants-esque spewing, please meet Sir Broderick, because he’s the only thing that made me not just smile, but actually burst into giggles today. They promised not to put him down until I get him into foster care, now that they know he’s not some Cujo-monster from hell. So Happy New Year, Mr. Brody. At least someone’s benefiting from the dysfunction – I get it, you looney Schutzhund-headed gooftard.

The evil, angry monster who was just doing what he'd been trained.

Mush head.

See, offer up a little German and you get a big, disgusting smile in return.

These guys acted like they'd known each other forever. Very sad-faced sit- and down-stays here.

I’m reading you guys, I promise. I’m even laughing here and there. I just … well, you know why now, don’t you? And it is TMI Thursday, is it not? I’ll be back, as always … (and, having glanced as IPs … if the FUCKING STUPID, CLINGY MAN-CHILD STALKER FROM MICHIGAN DOES NOT GET OVER HIMSELF AND HIS FANTASIES OF US BEING TOGETHER, SO HELP ME, I WILL ANSWER THE PHONE NEXT TIME AND TELL HIM EXACTLY WHERE [AND HOW] TO SHOVE IT, BECAUSE I AM JUST THAT PISSED.

The end. Breathing, recovering, and coming back for more in a few.

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So that was Christmas

Christmas and I didn’t have much to say to one another this year, which seems to have been true for most of my friends’ Christmases as well. The holidays just weren’t convincing enough cause for celebration, it seems.

The eve of Christmas Eve was spent putting the cats to sleep, after spending all day curled up in bed with them and alternating between denial and tears. And when the time came, it was worse than I’d braced for. It couldn’t have been helped, but still … nothing like assembly-line euthanasia to get you in the holiday spirit.

Christmas Eve itself involved signing papers at the crematory and then heading for the weekly hour with the Psych Spectacular, which was probably exactly where I needed to be right then, anyway. The session revolved more around animal rescue experiences than it did anything else—but really, it was probably better therapy for that moment than anything else could have been.

But night fell, reality returned, and I tuned out the Muppet Christmas Carol playing on the television with the buffer of drink, until I could crawl into bed without noticing the striking lack of kitties there. Coping skills fail, no doubt.

Christmas morning, I woke up to a hangover, a half-empty bed, and to a room that had once again flooded from the night’s rain. There was nothing to do but blink, sigh, and splash upstairs for the usual gift-opening tradition. I coasted through the ceremonies on autopilot, and the rest of the day was equally forced. I have never in my life hated Christmas as much as I did this year. It was awkward. It was a hassle. It was fake.

For lunch at my grandparents’ house, the Hobbit tied her hair in a pink ribbon and donned pearls. I, realizing I had nothing presentable left after all of the flooding, donned slob wear and a thin smile instead. I showed up and could barely look anyone in the eye. I felt like a fraud. I snorted audibly at my sister’s eager suck-uppitude, and when my grandmother asked when my next semester started, I answered frankly, “I have no idea.” I fought the urge to roll my eyes when my other sister jumped in to save face, with the date and course load she had selected. It just didn’t matter to me.

I went out to visit with Elsie afterward, for lack of anything better to do. It was freezing and there was nothing outside with which to distract myself, but it was better than being confined in the house with forced small talk and polite conversation.

An hour later, my grandfather poured me a cup of coffee and told me he’d like to know more about my job and my future plans. So I joined him in the sunroom where we talked about the field of veterinary medicine and he offered to introduce me to the higher-ups at the vet school if I thought I might pursue the field as a career.

“Just try to hang in there,” he said after a minute, staring uncomfortably at the gift bags on the table before us. Struggling with an upbringing that mandated stoicism, and a granddaughter in pain, it was his way of saying he knew something was more than a little wrong. Livid with my mother for having shared so much of my stress and emotional distance when she herself couldn’t be bothered to acknowledge it to my face, I couldn’t stand to have my holiday indifference heaped onto anyone else. I left at 4, flipping peace signs to the sun when it graced the road with its presence and hoping to God that its rising the next morning might bring something better than this.

And surprisingly, it did, which I’ll get to later. But in the meantime, the predictable source of smiles from the day.

Being cute.

Puppy pounce!

Waiting for a stick.

Catching the stick.

OMG, STICK!!!!

And back to being cute.

So that was Christmas. Emphasis on the was, thank God.

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And then there were none

I don’t like going for a while without posting, but somehow I wind up taking random, yet regular absences anyway. This particular one started with a crashed laptop, and just went downhill from there. I was waiting until I could put up a semi-decent post, and one that, for once, was not animal related, because even I get tired of the theme sometimes. I had a crap ton of events to recap, and I probably still will eventually. But tonight is not the night for that.

For the last few months, my vets and I have thought that my cats just had a stubborn upper respiratory infection that they were sharing amongst themselves. Sure, there were other symptoms of being somewhat “off” but none that seemed to fit into any particular diagnostic category. Treatment after treatment did nothing to help.

And then Rousseau took a turn last night and prompted yet another consultation with yet another vet, and yet another diagnosis. Except that this one fit, and I kicked myself for not thinking of it before.

Noneffusive FIP.

The clinical signs were all there, the symptoms a painfully perfect match to the diagnosis. It was a textbook case, really.

He wanted a blood test to complete the diagnostic picture and I agreed, wanting so desperately to be wrong and knowing so well that we weren’t. And then I watched in miserable silence as the positive spot developed before the test was even completely finished.

“Terrible disease,” he said. “ … fatal … incurable.” Yeah, yeah, I knew, I knew.

We put her to sleep. The other four kitties have appointments tomorrow night. There’s no reason to draw out their suffering or wait for them to crash the rest of the way like Rousseau did; it’s gone on for too long as it is. I’m at a loss, guys.

2009 has royally, royally, royally sucked and I’m rolling over now. It wins, I give. So the dry spell on the Puddle is going to continue for a while, I’m guessing until after the holidays when things have a chance to settle down a little. I’ve just got nothing left right now.

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Two months

There are so many thoughts bursting to have their turn at being put into writing tonight, from the do-over trip to Asheville to the countless random observations from my day at work today that beg to be further examined. But all I can think right now is that five minutes ago, I took a pill. A tiny, tasteless pill that I tossed back without the usually-required assistance of water. It was taken dutifully, but not without a pang of resignation.

Things are going back to where they were over the summer, and whereas it was previously only lying down at the end of the day that sent me into irrational panic—manageable at least in its predictability—now it’s merely nightfall and the accompanying darkness that does the trick. Now it’s a passing thought that sends me back, no longer just in the privacy of my room, but also at school and at work. It’s noticeable and it’s getting worse, and I know better than to try to tough it out this time.

Over the summer, I reluctantly allowed the Psych Spectacular to write a prescription, but I took the pills for all of five days and never could make myself go back to them. No real reason, no more than there was almost a year before, when I managed to stay on the happy pill train for a whopping three months. I don’t have a good track record with meds, and the PS takes care to tread lightly when it comes to the subject. I know how she feels about it, and she knows how I feel about it. To me, it’s a last resort and one that I don’t want in the least. Still, she finds ways to make her point.

“It’s hard to hear that you had such a good day – to remember you sitting here beaming and talking about your future – and to know that twenty-four hours later, a flashback dropped you this far down … The meds would just be short-term, just to give you an edge over this stuff, a little relief … It’s not defeat, Inky, and it’s not a cop-out; you do so much on your own to work through this … And it’s not to drug you up. You know I’m not going to let that happen.”

In less than a minute, she can nail all of my concerns. Long-term dependence. Taking the easy way out. Becoming a zombie. And finally, sitting curled up on the couch across from her last week and petting TherapyCat to try to hide how much it killed me to say it, I simply whispered, “I give.”

Two months, she said. Just give it two months to start with. I considered whether this was a promise I could keep, and slowly agreed. Two months.

Tonight, the pride was harder to swallow than the pill itself.

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